In the oil and gas industry, hydrocarbons are accessed via a wellbore to provide a fluid flow path to a processing facility. Some of these hydrocarbon resources are located under bodies of water, such as lakes, seas, bays, rivers and/or oceans, while others are located at onshore locations. To transfer hydrocarbons from such locations, a pipeline and/or one or more different vessels (e.g., ship or tanker trucks) may be utilized through various segments from the wellbore and the processing facility.
Additionally, hydrocarbons may be transported from a production region to another region for consumption/processing into hydrocarbon-based products or from one hydrocarbon storage location to another. Transfer of hydrocarbons between such locations often requires one or more different vessels and routes over bodies of water, such as lakes, seas, bays, rivers and/or oceans.
Offshore leaks and/or spills from transfer operations may be problematic due to the hydrocarbons being released into a body of water. Typically, the hydrocarbons may form a slick on the surface of the water, which may be referred to as an oil slick. At the surface, the oil slicks are subjected to wave and currents, which results in the oil slick being distributed over large geographic areas.
These oil slicks may be removed by mechanical and other oil release management techniques. As an example, typical oil release management techniques include in situ burning, oil collection techniques and/or other oil release management techniques. The in situ burning techniques typically utilize the booms that are fire resistant to contain an oil slick. The in situ burning techniques typically include steps, such as containing the oil slick with booms, and igniting the captured oil. The burning of the oil produces large smoke pillars because the oil is not burned efficiently (e.g., portions of the fire being low in oxygen). Further, the inefficient burning results in residuals that may require further treatment.
Another oil release management technique is the oil collection technique. This technique typically involves steps, such as containing the oil slick with booms, utilizing skimmers with the booms to collect and capture the oil and then transporting the oil to an on-shore location or larger vessel for processing. As the oil slicks may be geographically dispersed, different size marine vessels may be utilized together, which may involve different oil management capabilities and coordination between the different marine vessels. Specifically, smaller marine vessels may be utilized to contain and collect the oil and larger marine vessels may offload the smaller vessels to handle the oil collected by the smaller vessels, as well as contain, collect and process the oil obtained by the larger vessel. The coordination and operation of these different sized vessels and transport of the collected water and oil introduces inefficacies into the operations.
Yet another oil release management technique involves the use of floating burners to dispose of the oil slick. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,695,810 describes a floating furnace that is used to burn oil residues and emulsions floating on a body of water. The furnace is described as including an insulating material that retains heat within the furnace. As another example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,663,149 describes a burner vessel that collects and burns oil floating on a body of water. The floating burners are capital expensive and fail to provide flexibility in operations.
As the management of hydrocarbon leaks and spills is a time consuming operation, a need exists to enhance operations to manage hydrocarbon releases with enhanced methods and systems. In particular, a need exists to enhance the collection and treatment of oil slicks in a more efficient manner. Further, a need exists for enhancements to floating burners, such that the burning of the hydrocarbons in the oil slick is more efficient and results in less or no residue and soot emissions.
Other related documents include Cooper et al., “One-Step Offshore Collection and Removal: Combining an Oleophilic Skimmer and Floating Burner”, AMOP conference (Jun. 6, 2012); Battelle, “Combustion: An oil spill mitigation tool”, Report for U.S. Department of Energy, Contract No. EY-76-C-06-1830, U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, D.C. (1979); Belore et al., Air jet atomization and burning of oil slicks, Proceedings of the Thirteenth Arctic and Marine Oilspill Program Technical Seminar, June 6-8, Edmonton, Alberta. Environment Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, pp. 289-304 (1990); Buist et al., Sub-sea containment: COOSRA research to date. Proceedings of the Fifth Arctic and Marine Oilspill Program Technical Seminar, June 15-17, Edmonton, Alberta. Environment Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. pp. 129-150 (1982); Caron, P. (Department of Civil Engineering and Applied Mechanics), Atomization methods for burning oil spills, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec. 29 (1988); Franken et al., “Combustive management of oil spills—Final report”, University of Arizona (1992); Koblanski, J.N., “An acoustical method of burning and collecting oil spills on cold open water surfaces”, Proceedings of the 1983 Oil Spill Conference, Feb. 28-Mar. 3, 1983; Lipski, C., “Study of in situ combustion of oil spills”, Environment Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Report to the Environmental Emergencies Technology Division, 24 (1986.); and Nordvik et al., “Mesoscale In Situ Burn Aeration Tests”, MSRC Technical Report 95-017, Washington, D.C. (1995).